Texas overwhelms WAC conference

State Hornet Staff

It is said that everything is bigger in Texas 

This season, the Western Athletic Conference added six new baseball programs to make the conference the second biggest on the West Coast, just behind the Pac-12 Conference.

Of the six teams, four come from the state of Texas, including Dallas Baptist University, Texas State University, University of Texas Arlington and the University of Texas San Antonio. The other two teams are CSU Bakersfield and Seattle University.

“Dallas Baptist and Texas State are the most notable (of the six schools),” said WAC Commissioner Jeff Hurt. “Both have been NCAA Tournament participants and from a strength standpoint, those two teams in particular are ones that will be contenders.”

Both Dallas Baptist and Texas State finished last season with 41 and 32 wins respectively and each have wins over ranked schools including Rice University, Texas Christian University and the University of Oregon.

“Top to bottom this is the strongest and biggest baseball conference we’ve had,” Hurt said.

Although Arlington and San Antonio have not seen much success with their baseball programs in recent years, both schools have won the Southland Conference Tournament in year’s past. San Antonio won in 2005 and Arlington won the year after.

But Sacramento State baseball’s head coach Reggie Christiansen is not distracted with a brand new conference schedule.

“We don’t worry about who we play, it’s how we play,” Christiansen said. “We play our game and just worry about getting better every single day.”

Sac State played both Seattle and Bakersfield, but has never played any Texas schools during the program’s existence. Last season, the Hornets swept the three game series with Seattle at home, but lost two of three to Bakersfield on the road.

Historically, the WAC has seen success with its baseball members, most recently Fresno State University winning the College World Series in 2008, but afterward Fresno State and the University of Nevada left for the Mountain West Conference and the University of Hawaii left for the Big West.

“We have been talking with Dallas Baptist as far back as four or five years ago,” Hurt said. “On an annual basis, we keep our eye out for teams that might be able to help your conference.”

Sac State will face its first new Texas opponent when they travel to Dallas Baptist on March 28 and then host Texas State the next weekend on April 5. 

Ryan can be reached on Twitter at @rskuhn